Herb Wolfson(pitcherinthe wry.blogspot.com)reminds us that Saudi Arabia is the source of the Islamic sect that spawned Isis.(Washaabi) as well as the source of Bin Laden and most of the hijackers of 9/11/ notoriety while Iran is the dedicated historical enemy of Isis and Suuni radicalism in general.Iran is also our enemy for the last 50+ years.The international scene is a gigantic chessboard where three dimensional chess is being played.The enemy of my enemy is my friend for a particular issue and leadership has to be nimble and smart.(We cannot support Assad under any circumstances nor can we declare war on him since we would be helping Shiite radicalism).The reversal of our Cuban policy is a sign that the Obama administration is trying to learn the new game.Tea party conservatism is demanding a return to the policies and practices of yesterday i.e.shunning Cuba and deep sixing the Iran nuclear detente.Emerson once said that “a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds”.Donald Trump is gathering all of the strands into one masterful hand and urging the political chariot over the cliff with the other.His immigration pronouncements are pushing the rest of his party candidates into more frank admission of a cruel and intolerant intent.On the democratic side Bernie Sanders campaign is pushing Hilary Clinton to the left and to the embracing of a continuation of the Obama policies.The dichotomy is clear and the direction of our future hangs on this next presidential election.
Speaking of small minds,I’ve heard three pronouncements by Dr. Ben Carson.One declaring “Black Lives Matter” to be nonsense.Another declaring that bigotry will always be with us because people with small brains are being born all the time and yet a third declaring the taxation issue to be simply solved by the application of tithing(religion based).There seems to be no understanding that a flat tax discriminates and biblical tithing makes no sense in the twenty first century.As to the relationship between small brains and bigotry, a world renowned pediatric neurosurgeon should know that brain size has little to do with it.Herman Cain (old 99) where have you gone?
While Hilary does her best to alienate people by refusing to be frank at first blush,the republican candidates are doing a rerun of 16 men(15 men and Karly Fiorina,the acquirer of Compaq which nearly destroyed Hewlett Packard)on a dead man’s chest;(GW?)Yo Ho Ho and a bottle of(and here’s the innovation)non-Cuban rum.Possibly Polish Vodka if the Poles can be persuaded to accept nuclear arms as part of NATO. Doesn’t anybody remember the so called Cuban crisis?Putin is good at three dimensional chess.It seems that 50 years is about the time needed to reverse dysfunctional national policies(it’s about the same time needed to declassify most secret documents.)It would appear that we are capable of”back to the future” reversion to those policies.
-
Follow
Following
Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
The Octogenarians 
Great information. Lucky me I reach on your own website by accident, I bookmarked it.
Daedal2207, when I said that I like your style I meant it. It is true that often style can overwhelm message content, but your style makes the content more interesting. Sometimes, despite style, content is not clear and efforts at clarity help all of us to grow.
I know that I do not know everything and thus when I concluded with “Is it something else?” it was intended as a sincere question. I am hoping to engage other minds as well as yours in the fun of clarification and exploration of other possibilities.
I like Daedal2207’s style. There are a few content issues that need clarification:
Dr. Ben Carson, the pioneering neurosurgeon, may indeed have some small thoughts, but the three examples selected to make this point need to be considered more expansively. When he was asked, “Do black lives matter?” the answer I (and the reporters) heard was the following: “Do black lives matter? Of course they do, and the fact of the matter is that the most likely cause of death for a young black male is homicide,” the Republican presidential candidate continued. “Let’s look at that and figure out what we can do to stop that.”
“People with small brains” is a common way of referring to those (we all know many of them) who demonstrate that they possess low cognitive ability. To make inappropriate generalities (for instance, bigotry based upon race) demonstrates poor judgment. Maybe Daedal2207 is just stylistically playing with meanings when he suggests that Dr. Carson intends it literally, but the following presents another distortion that carries more significance:
Daedal2207 writes, “There seems to be no understanding that a flat tax discriminates…” Of course people with “big brains” understand that we all must “discriminate” just to survive. For instance, we must discriminate between poisons and nourishment. In fact, we must discriminate among degrees of functional if we are to be successful at anything. In the context of Daedal2207’s statement we can only conjecture about how a flat tax could be construed to “discriminate” in an apparently negative fashion. Wikipedia gives us a basic definition: “A flat tax (short for flat tax rate) is a tax system with a constant marginal rate, usually applied to individual or corporate income. A true flat tax would be a proportional tax, but implementations are often progressive and sometimes regressive depending on deductions and exemptions in the tax base.
Flat tax – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia”
Maybe Daedal 2207 could explain in more detail just how a tax with this definition must necessarily “discriminate” in a negative fashion?
The particular Carson comment that I refer to Don, was to the effect that the movement was nonsense(Early in the interview).The “of course black lives matter…all lives matter” kind of response(not Carson’s alone …Jeb Bush and Bernie Sanders too)fails to consider the contextual meaning of the movement, its methods and implementation notwithstanding.(It is 50 year+after the initial Civil Rights movement!)
As to the flat tax discriminating(not corporate but individual)consider that the percentage of the income earned by people earning less than $20g per year.(even for one but devastatingly so for a family of four)going to food and shelter is much greater than the percentage going to those functions by people earning $100g or k if you prefer)The actual dollars available for education or other forms of self improvement, including health particularly if you rule out medicaid and medicare, are fearfully few.If this isn’t discrimination then we need ball and chain and whip to decide.
USA TODAY (Aug 24) printed an article by Ben Carson entitled “BlackLivesMatter misfire – Our righteous anger misdirected at politically convenient targets, not real culprits”. It provides a wealth of criteria with which we can measure the content of his character.
Daedal2207 may be ignoring the part of the flat tax definition that explains: “implementations are often progressive and sometimes regressive depending on deductions and exemptions in the tax base”. This means that it can be structured such that those with incomes up to a certain level will not pay any tax. Another probable outcome of a simplified flat tax is an increase of economic activity that will increase the chances that more citizens will be working at every level of achievement. For those who remain truly needy, direct welfare would likely be more efficient. We should always try to avoid enabling people to be their lesser selves.
Another possibility:
Daedal2207 may be operating from a mindset that understands tax policy to be negatively “discriminatory” to the degree that it ALLOWS any citizen to do better economically than any other citizen. This puts equal-economic-results on a high priority (a moral?) plane. It then makes sense to instruct government to develop and use redistribution powers to force this result. For those with this mindset, “fairness” measured by “equality-of-outcome” is like a religiously dictated conviction. The fact that productivity would suffer and fewer goods will be available to all becomes something of lesser concern.
Or, is it something else?
I am always glad to learn something new.Indeed what you have produced deviates from my understanding of a flat tax.Indeed it sounds like an alteration in a progressive tax.(It doesn’t matter how many angels are dancing on the head of a pin);tax reform is needed and you appear to agree.(Although you may not see it as essential to the providing of true equal opportunity and the proverbial level playing field.)
I am sorry that you suspect that style is being used to obscure the issues. I think that the issues are clear and my style is naturally somewhat waspish.(the insect not C.Wright Mill’s “Power Elite”)I find it superior to despairing caterwauling.I believe that you are above reversion to an ad hominem level of discourse so perhaps you can clarify your closing reference to a mysterious “something else”?
I believe the assessment is spot on. No further comment is necessary.
Reblogged this on daedal2207's Blog and commented:
A Biden candidacy and a Gore resurrection would demonstrate that groups in communication with each other(conflict is communication)start to resemble each other.More abstractly than party candidacy proliferation but more important is the danger of Liberal capitalist democracy starting to resemble Ideological Totalitarianism!